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Women’s Ashes | Australia’s all-time great all-rounder Ellyse Perry dropped for the opener

The holder of 253 caps for Australian Women in international cricket and three time winner of the Belinda Clarke award, Ellyse Perry finds herself carrying drinks in the 2022 Ashes WT20I opener. Despite her notable performances across formats over the years, her exclusion comes as surprising but not shocking.


When asked for a comment regarding her non-selection, coach Matthew Potts stated, “All our research shows, (and) particularly the trends in the men’s game that (the requirement is) for 5, 6 and 7 to score quickly at a higher strike rate. Once she wasn’t considered in the top order it became a different conversation that is why someone like Grace (Harris) has come in”


In the last two years, Perry has not been able to deliver the goods as a batter for Australia in T20I cricket, which is much to the surprise of many critics. Her average of 16.33 at a SR of 102.8 across 14 matches doesn’t even help her cause. During the same period all other batters who played more than three innings have both a better strike rate and average than Perry.


While her returns with the ball have been much better, the emergence of Tahlia McGrath as a first choice all-rounder diminished Perry’s chances as well. Furthermore, Nicola Carey coming off an unbeaten century and 74 run knock in her last two List A fixtures helped her seal the number 7 spot too. The growing stocks of Nicola Carey with the bat meant that Australia could go in with 6 proper bowlers with batting till number 8 in the form of Jess Jonassen.


While Perry remains a lynchpin for Australian women in the longer formats (WODIs and WTests) and would have her say later on in the Ashes. However, looking forward, she would need a remarkable turnaround in her game to reclaim her spot in the WT20I side for Australia.

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Tahlia McGrath’s all-round show powers Australia to easy win in Women’s Ashes opener

It wasn’t as easy as the scorecard says it is because chasing 170 in a women’s T20I is as difficult as chasing 200 plus in a men’s game. But local lady Tahlia McGrath who had already picked u0 three wickets with the ball had other ideas and played a blinder of a knock at her home ground Adeliade Oval to get Australia Women to the target of 170 with three overs remaining. The Aussies started cautiously only with skipper Meg Lanning and Alyssa Healy adding 26 for the first wicket before Healy was dismissed by Sophie Ecclestone. England would have thought that it was an opening, but it wasn’t to be as McGrath who joined her captain in the middle went behind the English bowlers right from the word go. After the two got together they didn’t give any chance to the Heather Knight led English side and recorded the highest second-wicket partnership for Australia in T20I cricket. Without losing any more wickets, the Southern Stars chased down the total courtesy of the unbeaten 144 runs stand which came in just 79 balls. McGrath remind unbeaten on 91 off 14 balls hitting 13 fours and a six in her blistering innings while Lanning made 64 off 44. Earlier in the evening, after being asked to bat first, England too had a great start with the bat with the opening pair of Tammy Beaumont and Danielle Wyatt adding 82 in the first 10 overs before Beaumont became Alana King’s maiden international wicket. Nat Sciver who joined Wyatt in the middle continued the offensive and the two had already added 59 off just 38 balls and were looking dangerous before McGrath removed them both in the same over and crushed England’s hopes of going past the 180 mark. Few boundaries at the end from Sophia Dunkley and Knight managed to get England to 169-4 at the end of their 20 overs. The two teams will now face off each other in the second T20I at the same venue on Saturday, January 22.

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U19 World Cup | India reach quarterfinals, Australia register big win over Scotland

India Under-19 team registered a convincing victory even after not playing with their two regular players in captain Yash Dhull and vice-captain Shaik Rasheed. The Indian team defeated Ireland by a huge margin of 174 runs to confirm their berth in the quarter-finals of the tournament. In another game, Australia also defeated minnows Scotland comprehensively to get their net run rate up and stay in the fight to march to the quarterfinals in the group death. Australia have won two of their games, but lost to Sri Lanka which is yet to play West Indies. Harnoor Angkrish shine in India win India were dealt a huge blow just ahead of the start of their Group B fixtures against Ireland as six of their players including the captain and the vice-captain returned positive results in the Rapid Antigen Tests for Covid-19. The management was barely able to field the playing xi. But after all that jitters faded and once the match began the Indian team showed how it is leaps and bounds ahead of its Irish opponents. With the help of Harnoor Singh’s 88, Angkrish Raghuvanshi’s 79 at the top and Rajvardhan Hangargekar’s quickfire 39*, the boys in blue were able to reach 307-5. Then, while bowling, there was no room given whatsoever for Ireland players to free their arms and the whole team was bowled out for 133 in the 39th over. Teague Wyllie guides Aussies home In another match, the Scottish batters did give a better account of themselves as opposed to their showing against West Indies in the previous game. In this game, they reached 236-8 in 50 overs, giving a respectable target of 237 for Australia to chase. Tomas Mackintosh and Charlie Tear hit respective fifties for the Scotts while William Salzmann and Aidan Cahill picked two wickets each for Australia. The Australian batters knew that they had to chase down the target in as little time as possible to get their net run rate up. Keeping that in mind, the top three Aussie batters showed class with Wyllie going on to register his maiden century in the tournament. He made unbeaten 101 to chase down the target in only the 40th over. This took Australia’s net run rate ahead but not ahead of Sri Lanka, so in case there is a close encounter between West Indies and the islanders, and the hosts managed to win it, the Aussies might still not qualify for the quarterfinals. So Australia will be hoping that whoever wins that game wins it by a big margin.